Viewed from the perspective of 1939, Germany's defeat in World War II was not surprising. From the outset, it was plain to planners on all sides that Germany lacked the global reach and economic strength to win a long war. What did stun contemporaries was the speed and scale of German successes in 1940, when France's sudden collapse seemed temporarily to reshape the strategic balance and open the possibility of a new Nazi-run order in Europe.
It is here that Andrew Nagorski's entertaining book begins—with Hitler making a visit to Paris at the end of June 1940, his head already full of the desperate need for conquests yet to come. As “1941: The Year Germany Lost the War” shows, the military domination of the European mainland did not resolve the mismatch between Germany's ambitions and resources. As the Battle of Britain made clear, Hitler lacked the naval and air power to knock the U.K., under prime minister Winston Churchill, out of the war.
Fears of Nazi domination of the Atlantic also made it easier for President Franklin Roosevelt to increase aid to the U.K. against the resistance of American isolationists. As Mr. Nagorski writes: “Roosevelt was intent on helping Britain prevail, no matter how fierce the opposition might be in the United States to his policies.” Crucially, once Britain depleted its financial reserves, which had been used to invest heavily in American arms production, Roosevelt was able to replace them with U.S. government money. The resultant supplies were provided to Hitler's enemies free of charge under the terms of the “Lend-Lease” legislation passed in March 1941.
